Mobile World Congress is starting with a bang. Right out of the gate:
- Sony Ericsson last night unveiled the much-expected Xperia Play – aka the “PlayStation phone” – ahead of its launch next month in selected European and Asian markets.
A CDMA version of the new handset will go on sale in the US with Verizon Wireless in the spring, a major boost for Sony Ericsson in the States. A slideout gaming keyboard featuring a digital D pad. Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor has been optimised for gaming on the new handset, which also features a four-inch screen. There will be 50 titles available, mostly in the Android Market, for its appearance next month.
- Samsung announced two new Android devices, the the Galaxy S II and a new 10″ tablet. the Galaxy S II has a 4.3” super AMOLED screen, compared with 4” for the Galaxy S, has a 1GHz dual-core processor, compared with a single core chip in the Galaxy S, and runs the latest Android Gingerbread platform.
the Galaxy Tab 10.1, is based on the Honeycomb platform, and is powered by a dual-core 1GHz processor. Vodafone customers in over 20 markets around the world will be the first to get the GALAXY Tab 10.1 when it goes on sale this spring.”
- Mobile apps attract almost as much mobile device use as messaging, and exceed the totals for voice calls and web browsing, according to a January 2011 survey by Zokem Research. Mobile apps are responsible for 667 minutes of use per user each month, almost as much as messaging (671 minutes), and far more than voice (531 minutes) and web browsing (422 minutes). Almost 10 percent of all smartphone “face time” is through the use of social networking apps. In terms of actual usage, only two third-party apps have greater than 30 percent penetration: Facebook and YouTube.
- CEO of Ericsson, the world’s largest infrastructure provider, says providing coverage in urban areas will become the biggest challenge facing the industry. Vestberg believes that networks will become a key differentiator for operators
- Australia’s largest operator Telstra has nixed the idea of using consumer femtocells as a way of coping with any future ‘capacity crunch,’ despite the fact it is having to cope with a doubling in data usage on its mobile network every 12 months.
- Global HSPA connections have now surpassed 400 million with around 17 million new connections being added each month, up from 9 million a year ago.
- Chinese telecom equipment maker ZTE is gunning to be among the world’s top three telecom equipment makers. ZTE earned about half of its revenues outside China last year by selling both handsets and fixed and wireless network gear.
- Smartphone adoption reached 27 percent of mobile subscribers in U.S. and Europe, an increase of 10 percentage points from the previous year, while European adoption reached 31 percent, up nearly 10 points versus year ago. More than 75 percent of mobile subscribers in Japan are connected media users, while 36 percent of mobile Americans and 29 percent of Europeans browsed the mobile web in December 2010.
- LightSquared announced the successful post launch testing and acceptance of the SkyTerra 1 satellite and Space-Based Network (SBN) from Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems. “The LightSquared network will empower our company to offer 4G speed, value and reliability while enabling universal wireless connectivity throughout the United States and Canada.
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